Radio and the internet

Tuning in

An old medium gets its digital act together

IT IS not as rich as television, nor as politically powerful as newspapers. But when it comes to the big challenge facing media—how to deal with the internet and technological change—radio is proving bolder than its peers. A groundbreaking online service launched quietly on March 31st is growing quickly, both in content and sophistication.

Radioplayer is both a website in its own right and a pop-up player embedded in stations' sites. It allows users to listen both to live radio and to archived programmes. The BBC's radio stations and most big commercial outfits are on it (an impressive achievement in itself, given the catfights that tend to break out between the BBC and commercial media). Michael Hill, who runs the service, expects hundreds of smaller ad-supported and community radio stations to join in the next few weeks.

At present most people still listen to old-fashioned AM / FM radios. Digital radios, which are easier to tune and have more stations, have sold surprisingly slowly. And internet radio seems to be stuck in a niche. Just 3% of live radio listening is via the internet, though the share is more than 5% for youth-oriented stations such as Kiss.

Online and, increasingly, on mobile phones, there is fierce competition from music-streaming services such as Last.fm, Spotify and we7, which allow users to assemble their own playlists. Many young people find these more compelling than radio. Using data from RAJAR, a ratings agency, Enders Analysis calculates that the average 15- to 24-year-old radio listener tunes in for almost 20% fewer minutes now than five years ago. As a result, advertising has drifted. Commercial radio brought in £139m in the fourth quarter of 2010, down from £160m in the same period ten years earlier.

Live radio has some inherent advantages over internet music-streaming services. Presenters and phone-ins humanise it, conveying “a sense that you are not alone in the world”, says Steve Parkinson of Bauer Media, which runs Kiss and Magic. Radio also helps people discover new music. Its big disadvantage is that it cannot be searched easily. Radioplayer introduces a search function, albeit a rudimentary one.

Bringing together lots of radio stations in a single online player should speed technological progress. Tim Davie, head of audio and music at the BBC, points out that Radioplayer sharpens competition not only over programming but also over search data and algorithms. Stations will compete to ensure that searches lead to their programmes (at the moment the BBC appears to be ahead in this respect). That ought to improve internet radio as a whole. Spotify, here they come.